Marcus Brutus being sent in a fishing-boat to Lilybæum, by Cneius
Papirius Carbo, who had sailed to Cossura, to discover if Pompeius were
there, and being surrounded by the ships, which Pompey had sent, turned
the point of his sword against himself, and threw himself on it with all
the weight of his body, at one of the ship’s benches. Cneius Pompeius,
being sent by the senate to Sicily, with full powers, having taken Carbo
prisoner, put him to death; he dies weeping with womanly weakness.
Sylla, having been created dictator, marched through the city with
twenty-four lictors, which no one had ever done before. He established
new regulations in the state; abridged the authority of the plebeian
tribunes; took from them the power of proposing laws; increased the
college of priests and augurs to fifteen; filled up the senate from the
equestrian order; took from the descendants of the proscribed persons
all power of reclaiming the property of their ancestors, and sold such
of their effects as had not been already confiscated, to the amount of
one hundred and fifty millions of sesterces. He ordered Lucretius Ofella
to be put to death in the forum, for having declared himself a candidate
for the consulship, without having previously obtained his permission;
and when the people of Rome were offended, he called a meeting, and told
them that Ofella was slain by his orders, [Y. R. 671. B. C. 81.] Cneius
Pompeius vanquished and killed, in Africa, Cneius Domitius, one of the
proscribed persons, and Hiarbas, king of Numidia, who were making
preparations for war. He triumphed over Africa, although not more than
twenty-four years of age, and only of equestrian rank, which never
happened to any man before. Caius Norbanus, of consular rank, being
proscribed, when he was taken at Rhodes, committed suicide. Mutilus, one
of the proscribed, coming privately and in disguise to the back door of
his wife Bastia’s house, was refused admission, and she told him that he
was a proscribed man, whereupon he stabbed himself, and sprinkled the
door of his wife’s house with his blood. Sylla took Nolla, a city of the
Samnites, [Y. R. 672. B. C. 80,] and led forth forty-seven legions into
the conquered lands, and divided them among them. [Y. R. 673. B. C. 79.]
He besieged and took the town of Volaterra, which was as yet at war with
him. Mitylene, the only town in Asia which continued to adhere to
Mithridates, was likewise stormed and demolished.